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I am going to avoid quoting one or more long posts, but re: "entitlements" --
This word now has a "bad rep" for many people because it comes with negative associations such as "entitled brat" referring to a teen, for example, who expect a new car for their sixteenth birthday. Somehow Social Security and Medicare have been lumped in with other programs in which someone does not pay anything into it (or very little) and then expects a major payout.
However, in my very definite opinion, people who pay into a program and are assured that they will receive a monthly payout IF they live long enough to collect it or leave one or more dependents, ARE entitled to the payouts promised them -- just like any other kind of insurance -- and hat is why seniors who have paid Social Security and Medicare taxes (i.e., insurance) for 40 years -- (and I am one of the those people) -- howl at the idea of it being eliminated or greatly reduced after having thought, with good reason, that Social Security would comprise a large part of their retirement.
That being said, I do think that SS should be revised -- but not for those people who are now over 50 and who do not want to switch over to some other investment or insurance program.
The trouble with revising SS and lessening the benefits for the younger people is that it puts the younger working crowd in the position of paying for us older people's benefits while not being assured of the same benefits in their own old age.
And the problem, I think, will only get worse -- and then what? As I wrote in another thread, what will happen if there are literally hundreds of "street people" in every city or large town? Are they just going to be left on the streets to quietly die? -- or will government expand and promote the "assisted suicide" plan, or simply bus them to another town and let that town deal with them?
(The above paragraph is just a vent, and I don't want it to be a distraction from the main topic.)
I think that is the main topic. It lends itself toward a more general discussion of homeless solutions, but that includes the subset of senior homeless. We have this situation, now what to do with it? It seems like the cities without a big homeless population will ignore it, and the ones with a big population struggle with throwing money at a problem with no real understanding of how to prevent the problem from getting worse, while also dealing with the current situation on the streets. Programs that help on the front-end to prevent people from losing their housing situation in the first place through small grants for sudden needs would save the government a fortune in long-term costs of dealing with that person once they are outside.
I also personally think that they need to bring back the SROs and use a short-term voucher program to get people into better shelters and SROs, then have social programs to help those folks get back integrated into the normal system of getting work, or filing for the programs they qualify for, paying their own rent (subsidized or low rents), and becoming part of society again. They call it "Housing First". The current model of making them figure out how to work through the system on their own isn't working. Some folks will need a bit (or a lot) more hand-holding. Obviously the mentally ill will need further support, and we are going to have to deal with that as a society. We can't just leave schizophrenics on the sidewalks in our residential communities or business districts. They need to be in-patients at least until they can get back on their meds and back into the mainstream. That's going to cost some serious bucks, but this situation was created back in the 70s when they eliminated public hospitals for the mentally ill. Some will not make it back into society, and unfortunately, they NEED to be in-patients for their own safety, as well as that of the greater society. Addicts will need to be steered into "shelter in exchange for treatment" situations, although many will not want to, the alternative will have to be more negative in order to make the shelter/treatment a more enticing option.
Can we think of more solutions that are aimed at preventing homeless seniors specifically? Maybe we can do more with senior centers, like providing program support people in senior centers to assist seniors in applying for the support programs they are eligible for. Or maybe sending hard copy, very simplified program information and applications to low-income seniors to help them apply. Provide this at a 5th grade reading level without confusing jargon and acronyms. Don't require online enrollment but provide easy mail-in forms instead. Low-income seniors could be targeted to receive these mailings by using SS and IRS databases to locate the eligible seniors out there. I think the "barrier" to this is that the government may not WANT that many folks to participate, as it would drive up the cost of the programs if everyone eligible applied.
Last edited by TheShadow; 11-30-2023 at 09:04 AM..
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I am going to avoid quoting one or more long posts, but re: "entitlements" --
This word now has a "bad rep" for many people because it comes with negative associations such as "entitled brat" referring to a teen, for example, who expect a new car for their sixteenth birthday. Somehow Social Security and Medicare have been lumped in with other programs in which someone does not pay anything into it (or very little) and then expects a major payout.
However, in my very definite opinion, people who pay into a program and are assured that they will receive a monthly payout IF they live long enough to collect it or leave one or more dependents, ARE entitled to the payouts promised them -- just like any other kind of insurance -- and hat is why seniors who have paid Social Security and Medicare taxes (i.e., insurance) for 40 years -- (and I am one of the those people) -- howl at the idea of it being eliminated or greatly reduced after having thought, with good reason, that Social Security would comprise a large part of their retirement.
That being said, I do think that SS should be revised -- but not for those people who are now over 50 and who do not want to switch over to some other investment or insurance program.
Entitlement is just some type of legal term that means a social program, regardless whether the user participated in it with his/her own contributions, or it is a pure welfare (ie, taxpayer funds gifted to to recipients of the funds) - I think entitlement thus means just that a person is legally entitled to receive a check from the government. But the word entitlement also gets used colloquially in the way you said, as "free money" from the government, and politicians who want to cut soc security slyly exploit this colloquial usage to lump social security (into which the future users paid taxes for decades) in the mind of voters (particularly younger voters) with welfare programs which are indeed free money (because users never paid anything into those programs). So I just tend to disregard the word entitlement; it really doesn't mean anything more than the government sending you some type of a check to which you are legally entitled.
Soc security will surely get revised, because when 25% per year of Soc Security funding runs out, it would be physically impossible to continue sending out the same checks to everyone. How it will be revised is still anybody's guess; there are a million different proposals. Your opinion, to not make any retrograde Soc Security changes for people aged 50+ in 2033 is definitely a fair one, but Soc Security payout is already based more on "empathy" than on fairness, so it would be unsurprising to me if the principle of "empathy" gets extended to the maximum (meaning gradual reduction of higher Soc Security checks, in order to increase lower ones).
The trouble with revising SS and lessening the benefits for the younger people is that it puts the younger working crowd in the position of paying for us older people's benefits while not being assured of the same benefits in their own old age.
If I put everything I think about this entire SS program and what I think should be done, people would go to sleep reading it because it would be VERY long and quite complicated. However, to address the above in a nutshell, I think the problem could be addressed by giving every dollar that everyone puts (or has put) into Social Security, with appropriate interest, back to them when they turn 65 (or 70 or whatever).
I could be wrong, but I think the majority of people just want what is fair, meaning they just don't want to be cheated. For those of us now retired or about to retire, it might be too late, but speaking just for myself, I would not 'howl" as long as all the money I put in was returned to me. I do think that although the original idea of Social Security was a good one, in hindsight I think it should have been handled as any other kind of savings program, only mandatory (but with options, like a 401k, with options starting from something like a simple 'cash' savings account to 100% stocks with many options in between) -- and it would also come with the ability to withdraw from it for such things as a down payment on a first home (but not to buy a new entertainment system, for example). After they reach age 65 (or whatever), they could then decide whether they wanted a lump sum payout or monthly payments, or possibly "half and half" -- but once the money was gone, that was it; and if there was any left at death, it could be willed like any other savings account (again, just like money left in a 401k). The problem, of course, would be what would happen if someone spends all their savings and then are left with nothing?
Which brings us back to the subject of this thread.
Social Security should remain unchanged indefinitely and the money taken from other areas. The government wastes a ton of money. We could cut back on the billions given yearly to other countries. I say this as someone who collects very little SS because of WEP. It won’t affect me but people need to look at the greater good.
We created the homeless problem when we shutdown the psychiatric hospitals without providing appropriate services. The plan was for services to be provided in the community via group homes but of course that never happened.
Katharsis, your plan won’t work because some people won’t save and others will have unpreventable obstacles that will prevent them from saving. The end result will be more old people on the streets.
Katharsis, your plan won’t work because some people won’t save and others will have unpreventable obstacles that will prevent them from saving. The end result will be more old people on the streets.
Well, as I said, the program would be MANDATORY -- but the problem would be (as I also said at the end of my post,) what would happen to those who just blew their Social Security payout (at age 65 or whatever) and then were left with nothing? Therefore, leaving us with the same problem as we have now -- what to do with those people who are left destitute and homeless, with no family able and willing to take them in.
That, I think is the problem we have and will continue to have -- and why federal, state and local governments might be forced to either keep "throwing money" at the problem or else be faced with some very harsh choices that I think very few people would want to even consider.
Last edited by katharsis; 11-30-2023 at 10:01 AM..
I could be wrong, but I think the majority of people just want what is fair, meaning they just don't want to be cheated. For those of us now retired or about to retire, it might be too late, but speaking just for myself, I would not 'howl" as long as all the money I put in was returned to me.
Some of this money has been held by the USG/ SSA since the 1980s in my case. So we are looking at 400% or 4x inflation in the value of those $$$. The 1990s earnings maybe 2x
In lieu of the several hundred thousand dollars I have paid into SS, I would want at least a million back to consider any cash-out deal "fair."
The 2023 Greater Vancouver Homeless Count revealed more than one in five of the region’s homeless, (22 per cent) are aged 55 or older.
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